The Assyrian and Hebrew Hymns of Praise

by Charles Gordon Cumming

2. Published and translated by Böllenrücher, Gebete und Hymnen an Nergal No. 2; also by King, Babylonian Magic, No. 46; translated by Jastrow, I, 471. Nine lines of praise are addressed to the god, when the tablet breaks off.

3. Published and translated by Böllenrücher, Gebete und Hymnen an Nergal No. 3. The beginning and end of the hymn are missing. Of the twelve lines remaining no single line is complete.

4. R. IV: 2, 26 No. 1; published and translated by Böllenrücher, No. 4; translated by Jastrow, I, 470. Only the first ten lines of this hymn are preserved. For the first eight lines, the second half line is a refrain.

5. R. IV: 2, 24 No. 1; published and translated by Böllenrücher, No. 5; translated by Jastrow, I, 469. Of this hymn thirty-eight lines are preserved and are so arranged in couplets that the first line gives a title or attribute of the deity, while the second lines begin with the words: “God Nergal” and repeat the first words of the preceding line. It is thus a hymn with responses, made probably by priest and choir.

6. Published by Craig, Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, X, 276; Published and translated by Böllenrücher, No. 6. The hymn is divided into two parts. The first part of some forty lines is addressed directly to the god. Of these forty lines there are eleven couplets, of which the first half lines make a double refrain. The second half of the hymn is in praise of the word of the god. Thirteen lines begin with, “His word.” The entire hymn is antiphonal in character.

7. R. IV: 2, 30 No. 1; Haupt, Akkadisch-Sumerische Keilschrifttexte, No. 20; published and translated by Böllenrücher, No. 7; translated by Jastrow, I, 478. The first fourteen lines of the hymn are in narrative style, praising the attack of Nergal upon the hostile land. After a gap, where some lines are missing, there are twenty-one lines of praise addressed directly to the god in the second person.

8. K 9880; published and translated by Böllenrücher, No. 8; translated by Jastrow, I, 477. It is an individual hymn, addressed directly to Nergal, of which after the twelfth line the tablet breaks off.

Hymns to Adad

1. R. IV: 2, 28 No. 2; transliterated and translated by Strong, Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, XX, 161; translated by Jastrow, I, 482. It is a fragment of nine lines of a hymn praising in the third person of the verb the power of Adad.

2. Transliterated and translated by Langdon, Sumerian and Babylonian Hymns, pages 280-283; also by Rogers, Cuneiform Parallels, page 147; also by Ungnad in Gressmann, Altorientalische Texte, pages 83f. It is characterized by Langdon, Rogers, and Ungnad as a hymn. It includes an invocation to the god of ten lines, a hymn proper of four lines, an address of Enlil to Ramman of ten lines and a narrative section of four lines.